Why you should get your cholesterol checked

From 1995 to 2005 the number of Missouri adults with high cholesterol rose by a third and now almost 40 percent of Missouri adults have high cholesterol. You could look perfectly healthy, feel perfectly healthy and still have high cholesterol, said health educator Lisa Britt with the state health department.

"There aren’t signs and symptoms for elevated cholesterol just like there aren’t signs and symptoms for high blood pressure," she said.

Part of that rise in the number of Missourians with high cholesterol might be because more people are getting their cholesterol checked, but Britt said that doesn’t account for all of the increase.

"Life styles have a lot to do with this," she said. "We eat fast food we aren’t very active we have an increased number of overweight and obese people in the United States ."

Knowing your cholesterol is important. High cholesterol can be an indicator of serious health problems.

"High cholesterol is one of the major controllable risk factors for coronary heart disease, heart attack and stroke as your blood cholesterol rises so does your risk for coronary heart disease," Britt said.

Adults over 20 should get their cholesterol checked at least every five years. A cholesterol test should include: total cholesterol, LDL cholesterol, HDL cholesterol and triglycerides. LDL is considered bad cholesterol and is the main source of buildup and artery blockage, HDL is considered good cholesterol and keeps LDL cholesterol from building up in the arteries and triglycerides are another form of fat in the blood.